We definitely need Wildcard+Regex support in host/domain name

[maxdad]

A typical AdAway generate host file is now over 2MB, over 60,000 lines.
There are so many dumb repeats due to lack of Wildcard and Regex.

It is so bad to see things like ;
1.abc.com
2.abc.com
...
on and on again

How about this ---
In custom filter we support wildcard in this syntax: .domain.[suffix]
And regex can take dnsmasq regex patch syntax using a pair of :: to indicate regex inside, such as:
:..domain..:
This will achieve exact same result as wildcard format ".domain.", but of course regex has much more flexibility.

Then when we merge with downloaded list, we can remove any line that matches our custom filter.

I did a quick experiment, I can easily cut down number of lines to almost 1/5, andresulted hosts file is less than 500KB vs 2MB. I am sure it can be shrunk even more with better written patterns.

[0-kaladin]

Hosts file doesn't take regex. Using dnsmasq isn't trivial but would allow regex matching.

[maxdad]

Ah that is right, hosts file is dumb...we will have to switch to use dnsmasq underneath if we want regex...
Let me do some research. I believe dnsmasq is shipped with every android by default, we might just need to tweak some things.

[weedy]

There are other ad blocking apps that fake being VPNs. They are able to do much smarter filtering and traffic inspection.
This might just be a sign that it's time to graduate from adaway.

[originalsouth]

Relevant for OISD users, see this update on their behalf.